Let me just ask you one question ?

Why cant an employer advertise a position with a price tag, a range which is visible to all the potential candicates . Just say he wants to hide an accountant with 3 to 5 years of experience and he is willing to pay only RM 3000 to RM 5000. Just set the criteria straight. Then , people with high salary will not bother to apply anymore and the low-salary worker will apply. Win-Win situation . Correct me if I am wrong, in the good old days of decades ago, big and MNCs companies in western always did that .  Now? HR could have filtered out those high salary demander by doing so . Will you as an employer or HR do so ? Why not?

If you read through all the salary negotiation related articles, those who always say hiding your salary is equal to lying are always from HR background ONLY and occasionally the big boss. Pretty much one sided. They just wanna low-ball the candidate.

One last repeated questions , if you try to and ask a shoe retailer how much his buying cost from the original factory . Will/should he honestly tell you the figures? You as a boss should knew already why he wont and will not tell you. If you wanna buy with the price he requested ( expected salary ), he is happy to proceed. If not he will get other potential customers .

Again, i always believe that a professional HR and the hiring manager should be able to judge the potential of a candidate through an interview ( structured interview) . That is what an interview for . To let the candidate being judged through whatever questions and challenges or test you have on him. He should be not judged based on whatever he earned previously. He could be earning below market rate already just let the next employer to low ball him once the last drawn salary revealed.

One last most important question, you have the budget of RM4000 to hire a person. Would you pay him according to what you have budgeted once you have found a suitable candidate ? Why do you need to know what his current salary then only offer him ? Say his current is RM2000 and you will happily offer him RM 4000 ?No, right ? You will definitely offer him the standard 20% "job hopping market rate" . He will be too naive to be happy.